or lenin or mao or etc

i’m curious. I don’t think I’m a marxist but I have been trying to read marxist theory and I got caught by my family and had a huge argument with everyone. it was really interesting because it seemed like we weren’t talking about the same thing at all. Things like everyone is paid the same or everything is made by the government etc, I know very little but I have asked and read the basics and I was able to point out that wasn’t true

i’m used to people being smug about things they know nothing about, but it’s interesting how they look down on communists, like looking at a silly child that doesn’t know anything - while not knowing anything about what communists said in the first place. I actually tried to pull out quotes from the book but they didn’t want me to, they actually refused to know what they hate, it’s strange. I mean, I do the same, I’ve never read fascist theory or ayn rand or stuff like that, so I can’t really blame them, but I don’t try to seriously argue with fascists and libertarians anyways

some of them have a lived experience in eastern europe or cuba or something so I can’t really argue against that, but when it’s just an argument I’ve never met someone extremely vehemently against communist thoughts who actually read any of what communists wrote

have you ever had like, a productive, genuine conversation with an anti-communist?